How to Deploy WordPress with Docker and Docker Compose

WordPress is an open-source and popular content management system. However, installing and setting up WordPress on a new server is a very time-consuming process, especially if you need to do it again and again. In this case, you can use Docker and Docker compose to simplify your WordPress installation process using just a single command.

In this post, we will show you how to deploy WordPress with Docker and Docker Compose.

Prerequisites

A fresh Ubuntu 20.04 server on the Atlantic.Net Cloud Platform
A root password configured on your server

Step 1 – Create Atlantic.Net Cloud Server

First, log in to your Atlantic.Net Cloud Server. Create a new server, choosing Ubuntu 20.04 as the operating system with at least 4GB RAM. Connect to your Cloud Server via SSH and log in using the credentials highlighted at the top of the page.

Once you are logged in to your Ubuntu 20.04 server, run the following command to update your base system with the latest available packages.

apt-get update -y

Step 2 – Install Docker and Docker Compose

First, you will need to install some required dependencies on your server. You can install them with the following command:

apt-get install apt-transport-https ca-certificates curl gnupg-agent software-properties-common -y

After installing all of them, add the Docker repository with the following command:

curl -fsSL https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu/gpg | apt-key add -
add-apt-repository "deb [arch=amd64] https://download.docker.com/linux/ubuntu $(lsb_release -cs) stable"

Once the repository is added, install Docker and Docker Compose with the following command:

apt-get install docker-ce docker-compose -y

After installing both packages, you can proceed to the next step.

Step 3 – Create a Docker-Compose YML File

Next, you will need to create a docker-compose.yml file to deploy the WordPress.

First, create a new directory named wordpress with the following command:

mkdir wordpress

Next, change the directory to wordpress and create a new docker-compose.yml file:

cd wordpress
nano docker-compose.yml

Add the following lines:

wordpress:
    image: wordpress
    links:
     - mariadb:mysql
    environment:
     - WORDPRESS_DB_PASSWORD=secure-password
     - WORDPRESS_DB_USER=root
    ports:
     - "your-server-ip:80:80"
    volumes:
     - ./html:/var/www/html
mariadb:
    image: mariadb
    environment:
     - MYSQL_ROOT_PASSWORD=secure-password
     - MYSQL_DATABASE=wordpress
    volumes:
     - ./database:/var/lib/mysql

Save and close the file when you are finished.

Note: Replaced your-server-ip with your public IP.

The above file will download WordPress and MariaDB images from the Docker registry, create a database and set a password, link both containers, and expose the container on port 80.

Step 4 – Deploy WordPress

Now, change the directory to wordpress and launch the WordPress and MariaDB container with the following command:

docker-compose up -d

You should get the following output:

Pulling mariadb (mariadb:)...
latest: Pulling from library/mariadb
345e3491a907: Pull complete
57671312ef6f: Pull complete
5e9250ddb7d0: Pull complete
2d512e2ff778: Pull complete
57c1a7dc2af9: Pull complete
b846f4f4774a: Pull complete
66409f940bd2: Pull complete
82d8723e99d8: Pull complete
55edbf0f673e: Pull complete
c34793730ad6: Pull complete
8f1925a0d734: Pull complete
72904fb5fd0b: Pull complete
Digest: sha256:0c3c560359a6da112134a52122aa9b78fec5f9dd292a01ee7954de450f25f0c1
Status: Downloaded newer image for mariadb:latest
Pulling wordpress (wordpress:)...
latest: Pulling from library/wordpress
69692152171a: Pull complete
2040822db325: Pull complete
9b4ca5ae9dfa: Pull complete
ac1fe7c6d966: Pull complete
5b26fc9ce030: Pull complete
3492f4769444: Pull complete
1dec05775a74: Pull complete
77107a42338e: Pull complete
f58e4093c52a: Pull complete
d32715f578d3: Pull complete
7a73fb2558ce: Pull complete
667b573fcff7: Pull complete
75e2da936ffe: Pull complete
759622df3a7b: Pull complete
c2f98ef02756: Pull complete
50e11300b0a6: Pull complete
de37513870b9: Pull complete
f25501789abc: Pull complete
0cf8e3442952: Pull complete
d45ce270a7e6: Pull complete
534cdc5a6ea6: Pull complete
Digest: sha256:e9da0d6c867249f364cd2292ea0dd01d7281e8dfbcc3e4b39b823f9a790b237b
Status: Downloaded newer image for wordpress:latest
Creating wordpress_mariadb_1 ... done
Creating wordpress_wordpress_1 ... done

You can verify the downloaded images with the following command:

docker images

Output:

REPOSITORY   TAG       IMAGE ID       CREATED       SIZE
wordpress    latest    c2dd1984ad5b   3 days ago    551MB
mariadb      latest    eff629089685   13 days ago   408MB

You can also verify the running container with the following command:

docker-compose ps

Output:

        Name                       Command               State           Ports         
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
wordpress_mariadb_1     docker-entrypoint.sh mysqld      Up      3306/tcp              
wordpress_wordpress_1   docker-entrypoint.sh apach ...   Up      45.58.43.20:80->80/tcp

Step 5 – Access WordPress Installation Wizard

At this point, WordPress has been deployed and listening on port 80. You can access it using the URL http://your-server-ip. You should see the following page:
WordPress Installation Page
You can now follow the steps to complete the WordPress installation.

If you want to update both WordPress and MariaDB images, run the following command:

docker-compose pull

Now, push changes to your containers using the commands below.

docker-compose up -d

If you want to stop and remove all containers, run the following command:

docker-compose down

Conclusion

In the above guide, you learned how to deploy a WordPress with Docker and Docker Compose. Try it out on dedicated hosting from Atlantic.Net.

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